


Never Saying Goodbye to You

by Akiko_Natsuko



Series: Gratsu [61]
Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Blood, Blood and Violence, Death, Denial, Established Relationship, Ghosts, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Haunting, M/M, Mental Instability, Obsession, Prompt: Obsession, gratsubingo2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-09-29 21:13:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20442614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akiko_Natsuko/pseuds/Akiko_Natsuko
Summary: “Hold on Natsu,” he was murmuring now, frantic words rising in volume as he heard the spectre of Natsu speaking again, trying to break through to him. You’re not real. You can’t stop me. “I’m going to get it right this time, and then I can change things. I can save you. I will save you.” How many times had he said those words now?Natsu was gone, and Gray was going to change that.





	Never Saying Goodbye to You

_Gray, how many times are you going to do this?_

“As many times as it takes,” Gray snapped, lifting his head to glare at Natsu, only to come up short as he found himself looking around his empty living room. It was just as he remembered, bare of all personal effects, the pictures that had once lined the walls now smashed and hidden away in the drawers. All the furniture had been pushed to the sides, giving him as much floor space as possible, and shaking his head, trying to ignore, the gnawing feeling that he should be worried that he was hearing spectres now, he turned his attention back to the complicated symbols he was etching into the wooden floor. He could probably do this in his sleep now, the images as deeply etched into his memory like the sight of Natsu….

No. He couldn’t think about that, he wouldn’t think about that, because if this worked, then Natsu and everything that had happened to him would be nothing more than a nightmare. A bad dream that had been a little too real for a time. His fingers were shaking now. _Gray, please…_ He could have sworn warm fingers brushed the back of his hand, and he jerked, dropping the shard of glass he had been using to carve the symbols. “NATSU?!”

There was no answer.

There was never an answer.

No, that wasn’t quite right. There had been answers once. He wasn’t sure how long ago now, but he knew that it had been when the living room had been different when he had been different. He remembered walking through the door and seeing Natsu dozing on the couch and looking up at the pictures of the two of them that covered the wall. He remembered nights curled together, and days spent laughing and fighting, but those memories were faded and distant now, as though they had belonged to a different lifetime. Or a different person. And maybe they had. He wasn’t sure about many things these days, but he knew that he was different. That he wasn’t the same Gray, who had been too slow, too angry…

Too late.

_Blood._

_ Blood and ash, so thick that he could practically taste it and in the middle of it all had been Natsu. Or, rather a grim mockery of his partner. If it hadn’t been for the fading flames, and the sound of the others screaming Natsu’s name in desperation, he wouldn’t have believed that the twisted, broken figure was the Dragon-slayer._

_He couldn’t believe it._

_He wouldn’t, not even when he fell to his knees just in time to hear his name one last time on Natsu’s bloody, blackened lips._

Blood welled up as he reached out again, snatching up the shard of glass. He didn’t feel the pain, but he saw the blood, and there was a roaring in his ears. Natsu’s roar. A dragon’s howl of pain and frustration. Of loss. It had been that sound that had broken him out of his fury that fateful day, reminding him that while Natsu’s might be E.N.D., he was still Natsu, the same, idiotic, headstrong Dragon-slayer that he had fallen in love.

That he loved.

Not past tense.

_Gray…_

“No.” Gray didn’t look up this time, wrapping his fingers tighter around the shard of glass, ignoring the sting as it pressed against the cut. He knew that Natsu wasn’t there. That the pleas for him to stop this, to accept that Natsu was gone, was merely his brain twisting the increasingly desperate pleas from his friends, trying to make him accept the truth of their words. Or maybe it was Natsu, because deep down, buried far beneath the grief and guilt, he knew that this wasn’t what the Fire mage would have wanted for him.

_Please, Gray…stop this. It’s not going to work._

Blood splattered the wooden floor, following the patterns as Gray carved them in as deeply as he could, desperately blocking out Natsu’s pleas. He needed to focus. He needed to make sure he got the runes, and circle right this time because he clearly hadn’t the last… he wasn’t sure how many times he had tried this now, and he didn’t care, just knowing that he had to keep trying. That if he could just get the spell perfect, he would be able to see Natsu again. The real Natsu. The one who had laughed with him kissed him, loved him. Not this ghost that pleaded with him to let him go, as though that could ever happen.

“Hold on Natsu,” he was murmuring now, frantic words rising in volume as he heard the spectre of Natsu speaking again, trying to break through to him. _You’re not real. You can’t stop me. _“I’m going to get it right this time, and then I can change things. I can save you. I will save you.” How many times had he said those words now? He remembered the first time he’d said them, when he’d all but wrenched the book out of Freed’s hands, not listening as the Rune Mage tried to explain that it would just let him say goodbye to an echo of Natsu. Giving him the precious seconds that he hadn’t had when he’d found Natsu. He hadn’t heard any of that. All he had heard was that he could see Natsu again, that he could change those seconds.

That he could change what had happened.

That he could save Natsu.

_GRAY! _It was a shout this time, and his grip slipped, slicing open his palm as he lifted his head. The spectre was there again, crouching in front of him this time, and reaching out with trembling hands that seemed to burn against his skin for a second. But when he blinked, nothing was touching him, although the image of Natsu didn’t fade. So close that he knew that he should have been able to feel the Dragon-slayer’s breath on his face, but there was nothing, and he was pulling away, searching for the shard again, needing to finish before it was too late when Natsu reached out again. This time there was no missing the brush of burning fingers against his cheek, and his breath caught, heart aching as for a moment he let himself lean into the touch.

“Natsu…” This was how Natsu had touched him the day they had confessed, reaching out to wipe the blood away from Gray’s face, before telling him to never scare him like that again because he couldn’t lose the man he loved. That had been a happy memory once. One that flooded him with warmth and always brought a smile to his lips. Now it hurt, and he tried to pull away, but the spectre followed, more insistent than usual.

_Gray, you need to stop this,_ Natsu was murmuring. _This spell can’t undo what was done, it’s just meant to give us this time to say…._

“NO!” Gray howled the word, cutting across Natsu was about to say. He had almost listened to the spectre, he had almost allowed himself to be swayed, but that meant saying goodbye. That meant giving up on Natsu, which was something he could never do and forgetting the shard, he flung himself forward, tracing the last of the runes onto the floor with bloody fingers, deaf to Natsu’s increasingly panicked pleas. “I’m going to save you, Natsu! Just wait for me!”

_But Gray, it’s already too late._


End file.
